hough the murder of Frances Brown was the most popularized because of the lipstick message and gruesome crime scene, it was actually the second murder supposedly committed by William Heirens. The first came six months prior, in June of 1945, and didn’t even make the front page of the local papers.
43-year-old Josephine Ross had been found in her home, dead from multiple stab wounds to the neck. A skirt had been wrapped around her neck, and her wounds had been taped shut. Police interviewed her fiance and several ex-boyfriends, all of whom had alibis. It was determined that Ross was killed by an intruder, likely one who was there to burgle her but who had been surprised to see her before they were able to complete the robbery. As nothing was taken, police assumed that after killing Ross, the suspect had fled. However, that was the end of the assumptions, as nothing further had been found at the scene. A few dark hairs were found clutched in Ross’s hand, though they only led police far enough to guess they were looking for a dark-haired suspect.
As there had been no suspicious characters reported at the scene, no witnesses, and no noise disturbances reported, it seemed for the time being that the Ross murder would go unsolved.
For just short of one month, the city was held in a sensationalized state of terror, egged on by the Chicago newspapers, which waited with bated breath for the next horrific crime scene to be discovered. Within the first week of 1946, it finally came when William Heirens, still unknown and unsuspected, committed his final crime. Heirens’ third murder was without a doubt the most brutal. Around 7:30 on the morning of January 7, James Degnan discovered that his six-year-old daughter Suzanne was missing from her bedroom. Police swarmed the home and immediately began a search of the upscale Chicago neighborhood. In the Degnan’s home, a crumpled ransom note was discovered in Suzanne’s room, which demanded $20,000 from the family. It also listed orders not to involve the police and claimed more orders would follow. As police doubled their search, they discovered the ransom note was nothing more than a ruse. Twelve hours after she was reported missing, young Suzanne Degnan was found dead. Around 7 pm that evening, Suzanne’s severed head was found floating in a sewer near the Degnan home, the ribbons that had been tied in her hair that morning were still in place. Before long, her legs and torso were also discovered in nearby sewer basins. Once again, Chicago was caught up in a horrific but captivating crime, though the police had yet to connect it to the murders of the Lipstick Killer officially. The public waited to see who would be arrested, but it would be almost six months before a likely arrest came.
That is, until six months later when William Heirens committed his second murder, the one that would become the hot topic of Chicago, and kick the police investigation into high gear.
On December 11, 1945, 32-year-old Frances Brown was discovered savagely murdered. Like the Ross murder, Brown’s head was wrapped, this time in towels. Also, like the Ross murder, there was a startling lack of evidence. In the apartment, the police had found no fingerprints, no evidence of a burglary, and no hint of who the murderer could have been. There was, however, one glaring clue left for police – the strange message scrawled on the living room wall in Brown’s own red lipstick. Immediately the media picked up the case and splashed it across the front page, branding the culprit as “The Lipstick Killer.”
Of course, thus far, the Lipstick Killer was nameless, an unidentified man (or woman, as the police once insisted) on a silent rampage through the streets of Chicago.
As the Chicago police investigated the Degnan kidnapping and murder and the Ross and Brown murders, William Heirens enjoyed life as a young playboy at the University of Chicago.
As June 26 rolled around, Heirens was at the top of his game. He had recently celebrated an uncle’s safe return from the war, took a ballroom dancing class, and developed an interest in playing chess. He was even in the midst of a budding romance with a classmate, whom he planned to take on a date that night – he just needed some extra cash.
William Heirens originally planned to cash a savings bond for $1,000 at the post office (which he’d procured through theft). Unfortunately, the post office was closed when he arrived. This was no matter to Heirens. As had become second nature to him, Heirens reached into an open apartment door in the same upscale neighborhood where Suzanne Degnan once lived.
But the tenant of the apartment spotted him. As Heirens fled, he was followed by two policemen. Cornered, he pulled a gun from the back of his jeans, one he claimed to have packed in case he was mugged while carrying the bond, and turned it on the two officers. Discrepancies have been found between William Heirens’s account of his arrest and that of the two officers. The officers claim that Heirens fired at them, and Heirens claims that the police shot first. Whatever the case, shots were fired, and Heirens fled. A chase ensued, which culminated in an almost comical apprehension: an off-duty police officer, still in his swim trunks from a day at the beach, stopped Heirens in his tracks by smashing a stack of flower pots over his head and rendering him unconscious. While his arrest was unpleasant, William Heirens would come to realize being hit on the head with a flower pot was the most pleasant thing he would experience for a long while, as the next few days would prove to be some of the worst of William Heirens’ life. After having his head stitched up, Heirens was transported to the hospital wing of the Cook County Jail. There he was subjected to a torturous interrogation, during which he slipped in and out of consciousness due to pain, drugs, and exhaustion. After naming him as the suspected Lipstick Killer, the police searched Heiren’s room at the university, his parents’home, and a locker he kept at a local
train station. In the locker, they found evidence of his lifetime hobby of thievery, and after taking his fingerprints, discovered that they were a 9-point match to those found on the Dengen ransom note – a fact that would later be disputed. Despite these facts, William Heirens did not confess to any of the three murders, much to the police’s dismay. In an effort to get him to admit to at least one of them, police enlisted the help of several nurses and one doctor and reverted to sinister methods.During one interrogation session, a nurse poured ether on Heirens genitals while he was strapped to a bed. During another, a police officer repeatedly punched him in the stomach while chanting details of the Dengen murder in an effort to spark recognition in Heirens.Several days into his interrogation, a spinal tap was administered in an effort to force Heirens into confessing to being the Lipstick Killer. A polygraph was ordered after the spinal tap, but Heirens was in too much pain for an accurate reading to be assessed. One doctor even injected Heirens with sodium pentothal, known to the layman as a “truth serum,” though it did nothing more than put him in a state of semi-conscious delirium. After four torturous days, Heirens eventually began to mutter the beginnings of a confession. While under the influence of the sodium pentothal solution and hovering somewhere between excruciating pain and unconsciousness, Heirens spoke of a man named “George” who could potentially have committed the murders.Police searched for a George and questioned Heirens’friends and family but ultimately came up empty-handed. The fact that Heirens’middle name was George ultimately led police to believe the statement to be somewhat of a confession to being the Lipstick Killer.
“...one glaring clue left for police – the strange message scrawled on the living room wall...”